The Story of the Rich Young Man
I had heard about this Jesus for several months now. He had been going from town-to-town teaching and performing these impossible miracles. In fact, one of my relatives had been healed by him. My cousin Silas had been paralyzed as a child when he fell off the roof. A few months ago, he met Jesus. Jesus told him to stand up, pick up the mat he was lying on, and walk. And just like that, Silas was healed. I’ll never forget when I first saw Silas after his healing. He walked up to me with the biggest smile I’ve ever seen on anyone’s face. I couldn’t believe my eyes. He couldn’t stop talking about Jesus and kept calling him “the Messiah”.
Today was the day that I would finally get to meet this man from Nazareth (of all places). He had just arrived at our village. When I arrived at the center of town that morning, it seemed as if everyone had showed up to see what all the buzz was about. A long line of people had formed waiting patiently to meet him. Jesus did seem to be enjoying himself as he talked to anyone and everyone who approached him.
Why had I come? I wanted to meet Jesus more out of curiosity than anything else. If you looked at my life, things were going pretty well. I was the leader of the richest family in town. Everyone respected our family. My father had been very devout, kept all of the laws, and had taught me to do the same. When he passed away, I took over the family business. Through hard work and a little bit of risk-taking, I was able to grow our business by twofold. I thanked God for this good fortune and made it a point to be the largest benefactor to our temple. Needless to say, I wasn’t like a lot of these people waiting in line who needed something from Jesus.
Anyways, it was finally my turn to meet Jesus. As I walked up to him, I did not notice anything particularly impressive about him at first. But when his eyes met mine and I heard him greet me, I felt like he already knew me. “Impossible”, I thought. For a second, I was speechless. Then I remembered the question that I planned to ask him and managed to say, “Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” I figured he would say something about keeping the commandments, and I could honestly reply that I had. It’s not exactly like I was looking for an “attaboy” from him, but then again, maybe I was.
So, I asked him the question and sure enough, he listed off the commandments and asked me if I had kept those. I told him that I had since I was a child. I figured he would say, “Great job! You’re all good. No worries for you. You’ll have eternal life, no problem.” But he didn’t say that. He threw me for a complete loop when he told me that I was still lacking something. For the second time that day, I was speechless. Then he said that I should sell everything I have, give the money to the poor, and come follow him. I couldn’t believe it. This man who I had just met was telling me to give up everything I owned. If anyone else had said that to me, I would have said they were crazy. But when Jesus said it, for a moment, I felt my heart stir with joy and pictured myself dropping everything to follow him. I honestly considered it but only for a minute before reality set in. In truth, I had worked way too hard to get to where I was. There was no way I was giving all of that up and risking it all on Jesus. I walked away without another word and I remember wondering why I felt so unhappy.
In his book Searching for and Maintaining Peace, author Fr. Jacques Phillipe says that in order to have peace in our hearts and in our lives, we must be willing to abandon ourselves completely to God. As he puts it, “We must put everything, without exception, into the hands of God.”2 I have to admit that the idea of this is quite terrifying. Are we all called to give up everything we own like the rich young man in the story and lead the life of a missionary?
I would argue that although some are called to that, for most of us, the answer is no. While Jesus did call the rich young man to this, there are many instances in the Bible where He heals someone and then sends them back to their family or town to be a witness there. God does not have the same plan for everyone.
Fr. Phillipe makes the distinction that while “God asks for everything, he doesn’t necessarily take everything…the Lord asks only an attitude of detachment at the level of the heart, a disposition to give Him everything.” It requires us to be open to God’s call in our lives and to trust in his goodness no matter what that call is. So, whether Jesus is calling you to follow Him in a foreign land or right where you are, the key is our willingness to surrender everything to Him and trust in His will for our lives.
I can’t help but wonder whatever happened to the rich young man. Surely, he kept coming back to those words Jesus spoke to him. Did he eventually become a Christian? Perhaps, he was one of the first martyrs. Or maybe, he never was able to take that leap of faith.
What is Jesus asking of you today?
References:
The Story of the Rich Young Man is taken from Mt 19:16-30, Mk 10:17-31, and Lk 18:18-30.
Searching for and Maintaining Peace, Fr Jacques Phillipe, Editions des Beatitudes, chapter 6.